


Hard-Headed As A Rock

by chronicAngel



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Arranged Marriage, Other, POV Third Person, Sad Ending
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-09
Updated: 2016-10-09
Packaged: 2018-08-20 08:55:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,552
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8243639
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chronicAngel/pseuds/chronicAngel
Summary: Toph just isn't the marrying type.





	

Her parents never ask her to leave her room unless it is dinner or they have an unpleasant announcement. It has always been this way, since she was a small child and could barely sit at the table and probably even earlier than that, and since they discovered her earthbending last year they have been even more determined to allow her to stay away and lock herself up, as if they're disappointed in her because of her ability. She no longer has an earthbending instructor, due to a combination of the fact that her parents no longer think she needs one and the fact that the way they learned she could earthbend was because she got frustrated with his treating her like a porcelain doll and broke his nose by raising a patch of earth a la uppercut.

It is due to this simple fact that she arrives already in a negative mood when her parents call her into the main room of their large home. Her arms are crossed over her chest and her bangs hang loose over her eyes as if that would actually stifle her ability to see, and she is committing another one of her passive-aggressive acts of rebellion by wearing a stolen pair of her father's pants and a robe she has cut short to be a shirt as opposed to the dress her mother picked for her to wear this morning. When she stops in the center of the room, she recognizes her father and her mother in their usual places, but notices a third person who doesn't belong, and has trouble writing off the skinny man as one of the guards. "Mother, father, you wanted to see me?" It isn't quite a sneer, but her impatience for this meeting is poorly disguised.

She cannot see her parents, but she can almost feel the large smile her mother wears, oversaturated with a sweetness that makes Toph want to gag. Despite her pretend enthusiasm that both she and Toph know is not real, but it is possible neither of the other idiots in the room have realized is fake, she doesn't speak for the entire interaction, instead remaining still and silent, like she is having a portrait done. Instead, her father stands from where he had been sitting on a pillow on the floor, the other man nervously following suit. "Toph, this is Hyeon-Ju An, a jeweler from a city up North, and your soon-to-be husband."

The man, who she supposes is Hyeon-Ju, bows to her respectfully until he is nearly doubled over, and she supposes she can get used to that.

Still, she finds herself making a face at her parents and Hyeon-Ju as if they are something truly disgusting, like some sort of animal dung in the yard that she has stepped in whilst barefoot. "Sorry, you seem like a cool guy and all, but I'm really not the marrying type." Her father glares at her sternly, like he is silently scolding her as if that has ever worked to stop her in the past, and Hyeon-Ju looks incredibly startled by her reaction to their engagement, like anyone would just accept that news.

"This is not a matter of choice, Toph. You are my daughter and I choose who you are betrothed to, so you _will_ marry Hyeon-Ju in the spring and you _will_ be a perfect wife and mother."

Defiantly, she stomps and sends the stone floor underneath her father's feet shooting up, growing until it has encased his whole body up to his neck and his heartbeat reveals that he is beyond startled approaching "scared" territory. Her fiancé, though he shouldn't be that for much longer if she has her way, takes a single step back, staring at the two of them in wide-eyed, abject horror as she moves closer to her dear old dad and she's not sure he knew what he was signing up for when he asked her father for her hand in marriage. "You think you can still boss me around? You think I can't choose? Watch me!"

Stubbornly, her father and her glare at each other before she turns on her heel and begins to storm off in the direction of the garden, and she doesn't let her father free from his prison because she'd like to see how he's going to get out of that if he's not willing to compromise with her. Once she's outside with the grass beneath her feet and the cold night air hitting her skin she almost immediately feels better, and she continues to walk through the area until she reaches a little stone bench toward the middle of the yard that she has visited likely a thousand times. She sits on it with a frustrated huff, happy that she is now tall enough that her feet still touch the ground when she takes a seat, and she crosses her arms and mutters to herself about how stupid her father is being. It only takes a minute for her to sense someone walking toward where she sits, and she doesn't relax when it is her betrothed. She doesn't relax until he sits next to her and just stays silent until she leaves multiple minutes later.

* * *

"Even the Earth King didn't have an arranged marriage, but you're so greedy and terrible that you'd rather sell me off to some random jeweler from the North than let me figure out love and marriage on my own! Maybe I don't want to get married and have kids and sacrifice my whole life to a family that I never signed up for!" It's been a month since she became engaged and she's still arguing with her father about it now that snow is starting blanket the ground.

He looks calm on the outside, but she knows that it's only a matter of time before his face and vocal cords betray him and he is screaming back at her, and she almost lives for that reaction. "This is not up for discussion, Toph."

A single step toward him and his expression doesn't shift, but a second and she can sense he's afraid, as if she might imprison him in rock again or do something even worse than that which she is certain she would enjoy doing. She wishes her glare were burning into his skull and leaving hideous holes in his head so everyone would know how terrible he is and would shame him for being such a horrible father. She knows, logically, that that is not what would happen and that people would most likely not even notice the holes, but it brings her immense satisfaction to think that if her glare were shooting actual lasers at him it might mean something to someone other than the two of them. "You're right, it's not. I'm not getting married."

"You are a child and you will listen to me!"

"If I'm a child then why are you trying to marry me off to someone I don't even know?!" He fumbles for a second, raising his hand and waving it around in the air as if trying to catch words that are fluttering around just in front of him but he can't quite get a hold of them. She smirks at him, because she knows that this would be the point at which she won if her father wasn't so set on this. As it is, it is amusing to feel him fumble so completely when he and her mother still don't think she even knows what they are doing, don't even know that she has learned how to see through her feet so she is not a useless little blind girl, even if he won't change his mind.

Finally, he seems to give up on forming an argument, instead glaring at her and inching closer to her face as he seethes, until finally he is only a few inches away and she can feel his breath on her face. " _Go_ to your _room._ " He punctuates the sentence funnily, but she understands its meaning anyway and huffs as she turns around and storms up the stairs to her bedroom, where two bodyguards stand outside the door. She uses her earthbending to open it, and slams it behind her as she throws her small body onto the soft bed she has only had for a year now, twisting her fingers into the ornate green sheets.

She only has a minute to collect herself before there is a gentle, almost hesitant knock on the door.

Her mother doesn't wait for her to yell a response to enter her room, sitting on the bed next to her feet without making any noise during the journey across the floor to her current position. "My Toph..." Toph can feel her mother's loving gaze on her, and almost feels vulnerable. "Your father didn't mean to hurt your feelings, you know... We only want what's best for you, and this is truly what we believe is best for you. Will you please try to be more open to the idea of this marriage, my little rock?"

When Toph doesn't respond or look up, her mother lets out a small sigh, because she should have known of her own daughter's stubbornness going into this conversation, and stands to leave the room.

* * *

It has now been three months since she became engaged and she hasn't had a single conversation with her future husband, who she is due to marry in only a month and a half, though she has had many ~~arguments~~ conversations about him with her father and she has overheard many conversations with him. The ground is covered with snow and ice so she can't go outside whenever she is upset anymore, and because of this she has grown tired of her room. She wanders through the halls absentmindedly while two guards have a conversation she doesn't bother to pay attention to in a room she doesn't bother to pinpoint mentally, and for the most part she has no trouble ignoring her surroundings until she overhears a conversation between her father and Hyeon-Ju.

They are in a room to her left and they are whispering, though not very well, as if paranoid that she or someone else may overhear them, which is apparently a reasonable paranoia. "I'm so sorry." She recognizes her father's voice, and she suspects that this isn't the first time he's said this.

"For what, Mr. Beifong?" He sounds less genuinely curious and more tired, like he has heard this before and knows exactly why Toph's father is apologizing and is just as tired of hearing it as her father probably is of saying it. She decides that she shouldn't say anything just yet, because maybe she can pick up some crucial details here that they wouldn't say in front of her.

Her father sighs loudly, and the sound is overflowing with exhaustion. "Toph has always been stubborn, I was just hoping she would be more well-behaved when it came to your engagement... She's as hard-headed as a rock, that girl." She wants to say something about how she definitely got it from her father, but stays quiet, soft footsteps carrying her closer to the door so she can better listen in on their conversation. It is not hard to get a clear image of them from this distance, and she realizes that one of them is sitting down, though she isn't exactly sure which one of them it is; the other stands awkwardly a few feet away, and she decides that must be her dad purely by mannerisms.

"No need to apologize. I'm sure she'll come around eventually." Needless aggression flares up when she hears that.

"Oh I'm not so sure she will!" She shouts at the two of them, pushing the door open to reveal where she's standing, and she would normally smirk at the slight widening of her father's eyes as her future husband's head whips around to look at her. She ignores the excuses her father starts to spill in favor of turning around and running to her room, hands balled into fists at her sides as she sprints.

She encounters her mother in the hallway, but doesn't bother lifting her face or muttering an apology as she bumps into the woman, instead continuing her run as if running faster will get her away from this entire situation. She hates her father for selling her off to someone neither of them really knows that well just because he is wealthy, especially since she knows that he's no where near as wealthy as them, and she hates her mother for just going along with it, and she hates Hyeon-Ju for seeming to think that this is perfectly normal and that she should just come around eventually as if he knows anything about her. She doesn't want to be married and waste her life away being the possession of some man that she doesn't even know, put on display like she's some jewel and expected to just do whatever she's told. She's used to being a secret and she hates that her parents decided to announce her existence once she was eligible for marriage. She wonders if they thought that she might become the bride of the Earth King, but the joke's on them, she guesses, because he got married a month exactly after she turned sixteen, and she didn't want to marry him, anyway.

She can barely breathe as she slams the door behind her, and she ignores the tears streaming down her face because she's not so dumb and emotional to cry over a boy, even if she doesn't have feelings for him and is _most certainly not marrying him._ She chooses to tell herself that she's just winded because she's been running and not because she's upset. She is not breathless because of a person, that's for damn sure, she's just breathless because she ran across their entire house and wasn't breathing properly, she is gasping for breath because she ran a lot and not because her father is an idiot and she is being forced to marry someone she doesn't want to marry. She considers running away, but doesn't know where she would go or what she would do, which is all that has been holding her back for years.

Whoever it is that comes in her room, they don't knock, and she doesn't bother to comment on their rudeness or say that she wants to be alone as they close the door behind them and take a few hesitant steps toward her. After a minute, she identifies the person as Hyeon-Ju, and she finds her hands forming into fists at her sides as he comes closer and she wonders if she's going to punch him in the face if he stops within range. Instead, when he becomes close enough, she makes a wall between the two, the stone floor lifting up to his shoulders, and she thinks he stops because he is startled and not because he is respecting her boundaries. This is all but confirmed as he regains his calm and steps around the wall, finally resting his hands on her shoulders when he reaches her.

Neither of them says anything for a long while, the silence walking the thin, fragile line between comforting and unsettling. It takes everything she has not to turn around and scream at him until he realizes just what he's getting himself into and changes his mind, running away screaming from this marriage like a petulant child who didn't get his way, but she stays quiet. He clears his throat and moves to be standing in front of her, and it feels like he must be a foot taller than her and like she is a child all over again and not almost a grown adult who can make decisions for herself (such as who she is to marry).

"I have something for you." The way he says it is like he is trying to offer a compromise. She doesn't say anything.

She doesn't open her mouth as he gently puts the necklace on her, a simple thing with a strand of cool metal clinging to an even cooler turtle.

"It's apatite... The turtle, I mean. I thought it was fitting, since apatite is known for its use of personal power to achieve goals." Silence settles over them again like a blanket on a hot day, and she can feel him stare at her for a minute before sighing and ripping his eyes away; it's only now that she realizes he's been getting closer and closer the whole time he's been in the room and he hasn't stopped yet. His face is hovering only a few inches away from hers and she feels like she's trapped, a defenseless animal. She has never been the vulnerable one in a conversation.

Kissing him feels wrong, like they're two puzzle pieces that don't quite fit together but are being placed next to each other anyway because the shapes are close enough for the person assembling them. She doesn't kiss him back when he leans in, and so his lips are just against hers, warm and rough. She has never kissed anyone before and she feels almost sick to her stomach that this is the first time she has done it, that these are the circumstances under which it is happening. She does not want to kiss him.

He pulls back after almost a full minute when she doesn't start kissing him back, and she can't lift her face to look at him out of shame or some other feeling even if she wouldn't see anything in the empty world that she lives in when it comes to her eyes.

* * *

The robe she wears is a light green color that she has always loved in the past, and she now feels almost sick to be covered in it as she stands at the end of a long row of seats across from her soon-to-be husband. It's ceremonial and belonged to her mother and her grandmother before that, but not her great-grandmother, though the one she wore is almost identical to this one, because her great-grandmother's wedding robe was burned years ago by the Fire Nation along with her home and all of her other possessions. Toph's face is tilted downward, her blind eyes concentrated pointedly on her feet instead of the man in front of her as she mutters the vows that her mother wrote and revised for her possibly a hundred times over. She knows Hyeon-Ju can hear them, and that the man marrying them can hear them, but she isn't sure the people, most of which she doesn't even know or bother to try to recognize, can hear them.

When her eyes flash up to his face, nothing changes for her, but she can "see" his back straighten and the vows that he starts to deliver are just white noise that she doesn't even process as her blind gaze returns to her feet. She doesn't wear any shoes under the robe, despite her mother's insistence that she wear sandals at the very least, and it provides a clear image of the scene for her that she doesn't want and never asked for. Toph does not want to remember the day she was forced to get married to someone she didn't know, to give up her life.

Her parents sit in the front row next to his, and their fathers are whispering to each other about something she can't hear and doesn't bother to attempt to focus on while the women both sit off to the side, completely silent. Again Toph thinks that they are more like dolls or props than they are people, and they are treated that way, too, something she is not looking forward to at all-- actually, she doesn't think that she will accept being treated like that and if her _dearest husband_ has a problem with it then he can be the first to leave. She is not a doll or a prop, she is a human being and she has no problem with people knowing that.

Her face snaps up when he starts to lean in.

Kissing him still feels wrong.

Their faces fit together better than incorrect puzzle pieces now, more like she is a wall of rocks and he is an invading river, little streams of water slipping through, though for the most part she holds her ground and holds him back. The kiss is just as much a battle, a war even, as it is a romantic gesture, and she has no intentions of surrendering or making it easy for him any time soon. She hardly kisses him back, enough to convince the people watching them-- what might be a hundred people feels to her like there are _thousands_ of eyes on her-- that she might actually care for the man she is marrying, but they both know that she does not love him and she is not going to be a perfect little house wife. There is nothing he can do to change her or break her, and he is going to have to deal with her the way she is. Forever.


End file.
